Hello friends, Can anyone name a site or software that performs real-time screens for option trades? I have discovered www.avasaram.com, which offers screens for trades like calendar spreads, collars, covered calls, butterflies, condors, etc., and the screens come out three times per trading day with data delayed by 15 minutes. That's pretty good for a free service, but oftentimes its just not good enough and the trade is over and done with by the time the data has been posted to the site. Real-time seems to be the way to go. I know Optionvue does a good job, but was wondering if there were a cheaper (but comparably reliable) alternative. Thanks in advance for sharing. Steven
hmm.. try... thinkorswim.. if u have the client installed and have full access( a real account-) it does have some nice screeners .
If you don't have access to real time data, a screening system to alert you to the opportunity or better yet act upon it, and an electronic market-making platform it will be gone by the time you see it. Don't trust what you see on a free platform that posts three times per day and it's free. Trust what you see on ORC or RTS (about an $18K per month lease) or Bloomberg Time and Sales (the $1800 per month subscription). There exists little private armies all over Chicago and NYC who do nothing but what has been described. They also have paid for 'market-making' status.
A real-time scanner you spent a fortune to subscribe to tells you that some issue you never heard of has options with 950% front month vol and bid/ask .40 wide is a good candidate for a spread. Do you take the trade? Why not just focus your attention on a reasonable subset of popular issues with liquid options and tight markets?
Yes, I've considered doing that with Option Oracle, which allows for scanning in real time for trades in up to 4 strategies per scan, but only among a pre-set list of tickers. Happily, the software is free. I guess I could make up a list of all liquid options and tight markets. Aren't there quite a lot of options with really tight spreads these days, though? Where would one begin in assembling a list for screening? My thanks to you and everyone else on this thread! Steven
https://www.cboe.org/hybrid/pennypilot.aspx Also, if you're doing options with ThinkorSwim, they maintain a 'Penny Increment Option' list within the software.